If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Need help with my new BCF2000 + GPO [SOLVED!]

Hello!

Lately I bought a brand new BCF2000 (some of you may remember the thread, where you helped me decide between that and an UC-33E). I hooked it up to the PC, downloaded the newest drivers and firmware. Also installed a special preset for Cubase SX2 (which was kinda difficult, cause the Behringer Software kept crashing immediately after starting).

It works like a charm. I can mix, and steer around in the mixer, move the levers and everything. Everything is to my utmost happyness. But... I assigned one lever to CC1 (modulation), and wanted to draw the famous mod-curves in GPO. So I select the track I want to record. Then I click on "record" and start drawing. The data is successfully drawn into the track, but it's time-shifted! The modwheel data is drawn about 1-1,5 second ahead of what is played back. It's nearly impossible to accurately draw teh data, because I have to anticipate, where the music will be in 1-1,5 seconds...

Is that a latency issue? How can I work around that? How do you usually record the modwheel data after entering the notes?

Re: Need help with my new BCF2000 + GPO

Not sure what the source of the misalignment is but you can use the "pencil" tool in Cubase to draw the data into the track in the piano roll view. Anything you draw into the track should automatically be aligned with the note data no matter what latency you are getting from your audio/MIDI interface.

Re: Need help with my new BCF2000 + GPO

Originally Posted by musicpete

How do you usually record the modwheel data after entering the notes?

That's the way I record the modwheel data: when I'm playing back the notes I record the modwheel data to that track too. So I have two layers in this track: notes + velocity (first recording) and the modwheel data (second recording). After the recordings I stick (or splice - I don't know the right word) that two layers together. Is this what you mean?

Re: Need help with my new BCF2000 + GPO

Thank you for your replies! Somehow I forgot about this posting in all the madness that my life became recently...

@Tom: Thanks for that hint, but unfortunately that is what I already have been doing since I got GPO (I compose my music in Sibelius, then export it as a MIDI file to Cubase SX2). The pain in my left hand, in the finger joints and the wrist is a direct result of that: Clutching the mouse and drawing these curves for hours and hours did bad things to my left hand.... That is, why I got the BCF in the first place - To have a slider to draw these curves, without hurting myself even more.

@mixolydian: Hey, that is a great idea! Why didn't I think of that myself? So basically you mean: Play back the track, and record the modwheel data. Then copy/cut it, and paste it aligned to where I want it? I will make sure to try that.

After some investigation, I tend to think that the program latency might be the reason for this: Cubase plays back the track, but it fakes doing it in realtime. Instead it plays it back with a 1-2 second time-shift, in order to have time loading all the samples.
The recorded modwheel data, on the other hand, gets placed at the actual position. Which is, of course, a bit ahead of what is played back.

Hmmm, is there any Cubase wizard in this community that could help me with this? Is it possible to set up a fixed delay for midi events? So they will be placed at the correct position, when recording?

Thank you guys! You already helped me a lot! Maybe we can get to the bottom of this...

Re: Need help with my new BCF2000 + GPO

Originally Posted by musicpete

After some investigation, I tend to think that the program latency might be the reason for this: Cubase plays back the track, but it fakes doing it in realtime. Instead it plays it back with a 1-2 second time-shift, in order to have time loading all the samples.
The recorded modwheel data, on the other hand, gets placed at the actual position. Which is, of course, a bit ahead of what is played back.

Hmm, strange thing. You don't having an impuls reverb like SIR or something similar in your Cubase activated? Maybe a dumb question...

Re: Need help with my new BCF2000 + GPO

@Tom: The latency is way off, you are right. I use an M-Audio Delta 24/96 for my composing. The PC is a AMD Athlon XP2500+, Mainboard is an ASUS A7N8X Deluxe, 2GB of Corsair RAM, multiple Seagate Barracude EIDE 180GB HDs. Should work fine, or does that already quality as "stone age"?

My soundcard's latency is at about 768 samples right now. This is in a neffort to minimize the annoying kontakt problems. Doesn't help much, though.

@mixolydian: SIR? Hmmm, you know: It could be that I accidentally left it on in some effects channel. Maybe some other reverb can cause it, too? like Ambience? I will investigate that, when I will some time (which wil hopefully be within the next few days).

Re: Need help with my new BCF2000 + GPO

I just wanted to let you guys know that yesterday I finally was able to fix the problem!!! Here is what I did after a lot of research and thought:

There was a conflict with Cubase SX2.2's MIDI device detection. So I removed the Cubase "ignoreportfiler"-config file. Then I manually disabled all the MIDI devices that Cubase hid from me (but the stupid program kept them active in the background!!). There were a bunch of emulated MIDI ports active, which didn't mix well with the "real" ones. After doing that, I turned on "Use System time stamp" on my Delta AP 24/96 MIDI ports in Cubase's MIDI device setup.

And voilà: Suddenly I get 100% rock solid MIDI timing, when I use Fader #1 of my BCF2000 as a modwheel substitute. Yipeeh!

This comes in very handy, because the pain in my left hand lately has been so bad I could cry.